Fires in the West

[thistlebloom]

the only thing needed in wild lands to control herbivores are wolves. hunting around here may thin out some of them but it doesn't really improve the actual population when it comes down to diseases and culling out the weaklings. the hunters go after the trophies, etc.

Not so.There are documented filmings (trail cams) of wolves taking down healthy elk, deer, and moose, in our area. This is for training their young. These animals don't get eaten either. Just killed and their carcasses left. Wolves don't do a quick kill, they will gut a living animal and eat it while it's still struggling. That's the way it works of course, but not the Disney depiction most people assume.

All of the hunters I know personally, hunt to put food in the family freezer. The trophy hunter card is overplayed. Also these animals are harvested with a quick kill.

 

[thistlebloom]

when the need is there for getting it all burnt anyways?

Thankfully some agencies have changed their policies about fighting an out of control fire at all costs, lessening the danger to fire fighters.

However, after so many years of suppression the fires that do burn, burn much hotter and last longer doing unimaginable harm to those areas, that might not see recovery in a persons lifetime.

 

[bobm]

morons planted trees in a desert... i can't cry for them.

you've misplaced common sense and want to fawn that off on some mysterious "environmentalist" baloney...

the drought you folks had was real and people conserved but if you look at the statistics the majority of farmers didn't do much of anything to note. a few did, but not to the same extent as the people in the cities.

You may NOT realize it, but these moron farmers are the ones feeding the moron city people.

morons planted trees in a desert... i can't cry for them.

you've misplaced common sense and want to fawn that off on some mysterious "environmentalist" baloney...

the drought you folks had was real and people conserved but if you look at the statistics the majority of farmers didn't do much of anything to note. a few did, but not to the same extent as the people in the cities.

You may NOT realize it, but it is these very same moron farmers that grow and provide food to the city people .

 

[Rhodie Ranch]

^^^ yes, Thistle. You are correct in your synopsis of the human hunt for four legged animals and for the forest mishandling.

I have lived rural for 10 years now. Nobody runs off for trophys. They get their license and attempt to bag up to their limit for food consumption, within the time frame allowed for each season. In fact, in Oregon last year, it finally became legal to pick up road kill. You'll need to call into the authorities, give them your name and number and exact place for your pick up. That is so much better than a rotting carcass for weeks on end. My friend Mark picked up a deer last month, while a stranger picked up the other one, when a car hit two at the same time. Mark bagged it, called in, and then processed it the next day in his barn.

 

[Rhodie Ranch]

Now wait a minute, Flowerbug. As the drought continued, the feds charged more and more for water for the farmers, the Fed operated reservoirs were dropping in acre feet every day, and the farmers finally has to lay fallow to 1000's of acres of farmland. Some farms went belly up over time. Day laborers were laid off. Towns lost revenue. Land has sunk in inches. Aquifers have shrunk. Wells have gone dry. I know. I lived there.

The Hetch Hetchy and the other humongous reservoirs were drying up and we humans in many urban areas were put on a plan to conserve water. All of my shower water went into Lowes buckets and was tossed into the yard for foundation plants. We had a tiny patch of grass. We had to conserve and conserve. Lack of water is one of the reasons I and my Native California Husband left our state.

Then in 2016, the rains and snow came. We had snow melt, which is where the majority of the water comes from for the West. Snow melt. The reservoirs filled up. Conservation was no longer mandated, but the majority of humans continued to conserve as they had learned to.

Then the 2017 and 2018 winter...no snow little rain. Farmers were put on allotment. Humans were not. Farmers couldn't afford to buy the water from the Feds. Alternative irrigation methods were invested in, but not all farmers have the deep pockets to "try" something new. Micro drips for trees; underground irrigation for row crops; drones for farm monitoring; etc.

This situation that the drought put the West in was preceded by decades and decades of mismanagement and politics of our Federal Govt. Greedy people wanting water for growing communities, not for farmland.

I don't know how the West can continue to be the Fresh Veggie Salad Capital for the US if water isn't released on a greater scale and less costly method than it is now.

 

[Nyboy]

Thistle I have seen the website on wolves killing for fun. The hunters I know all hunt for the table. A few might have heads on the wall, but where taken for their meat not heads. My oldest friends father had several deer heads hanging in his restaurant. He grew up during the depression you can believe he wasted nothing from his kills.

 

[digitS']

Mounted deer heads: local taxidermist gets about $500.

Meat on deer?

Price of farm product?

Steve

 

[flowerbug]

Not so.There are documented filmings (trail cams) of wolves taking down healthy elk, deer, and moose, in our area. This is for training their young. These animals don't get eaten either. Just killed and their carcasses left. Wolves don't do a quick kill, they will gut a living animal and eat it while it's still struggling. That's the way it works of course, but not the Disney depiction most people assume.

All of the hunters I know personally, hunt to put food in the family freezer. The trophy hunter card is overplayed. Also these animals are harvested with a quick kill.

there are only deer around here, no elk and all three of the hunters i spoke with this year admitted they'd let does go by because they were holding out for the big buck. yes, this is anecdotal and not the sole impact of hunting in this area, but i also know that having wolves in the mix would improve the deer population overall a lot more than just having people hunting is accomplishing. a few isolated training kills isn't going to change that basic need in any ecosystem (for a top predator that actually does remove the weak and diseased animals from the herd).

and yep, i never said nature was kind, i think that's a valuable lesson for every person to not only learn but understand at the deepest level. and i really do think it would be good for people to have a real danger and competitor again (i keep mentioning saber toothed tigers) psychologically. we're just way too complacent and think way too much of ourselves in isolation. having a real bogeybear would give us something more interesting to be afraid of... (i'm not sure how many people actually understand my sense of humor, but it's not all light and fuzzy bunnies kind at times )... i often write a bit more tongue-in-cheek too and poke fun at myself as much as i'd poke fun at someone else.

human civilisation is always at risk as long as we are stuck on a single planet, but as of yet we don't even know if we can actually get to another planet let alone survive long there. so, um, we better figure out how to get along and treat this planet much better than we are. included in that should be places for wild life. i'll continue to fight for wild spaces and wild life the rest of my life and if i have any $ left over it's pretty likely i'll put some or all of that towards keeping some wild places wild. fires to burn, animals to do animal things, some which include eating each other... anyways all of this is far afield from gardening and fires... so i consider it all a remote aside if anything...

 

[flowerbug]

^^^ yes, Thistle. You are correct in your synopsis of the human hunt for four legged animals and for the forest mishandling.

I have lived rural for 10 years now. Nobody runs off for trophys. They get their license and attempt to bag up to their limit for food consumption, within the time frame allowed for each season. In fact, in Oregon last year, it finally became legal to pick up road kill. You'll need to call into the authorities, give them your name and number and exact place for your pick up. That is so much better than a rotting carcass for weeks on end. My friend Mark picked up a deer last month, while a stranger picked up the other one, when a car hit two at the same time. Mark bagged it, called in, and then processed it the next day in his barn.

nothing wrong at all with that IMO. around here there are enough scavengers that will also process a deer left along the road if they can get to it. we've had crows gnawing on one for quite some time already. luckily it is across the road and not in the regular wind-pattern for us to smell it. and yes, there are people who are more interested in putting meat into the freezer, but you cannot tell me that they are effective at taking down the diseased or weak herd members and in fact if they knew of one they'd likely not want to harvest it at all. i sure wouldn't. wolves will do that.

and yes, i do know the people around here and almost all of them hunt and so far the majority i've talked to admit they will take some for meat, but they also hold out for a trophy. *shrug* different neighborhood, or people aren't admitting what they're doing or you're not asking the right questions/people, etc.

you would think that in an agricultural area with a lot of farm fields and a lot of deer feeding on those fields that the hunters and farmers would be out there targetting the does to reduce the population, but that isn't what is happening from what i'm hearing...

 

[Nyboy]